Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Last weekend I gave an update at all of the Masses on our financial situation. I realize that many families are away traveling during the summer so I wanted to provide a written summary as well.
I want to thank everyone for their prayers and concerns as we addressed a shortfall in revenue. I greatly appreciate all of the advice and work the consultative bodies did in advising me and looking for solutions to the challenges at hand.
I have some good news and some difficult news. The good news is we didn’t end up in as much debt as we had originally projected. There were several reasons for this. First, the staff was very diligent in not overspending and in many cases underspending their budgets. We also saw a slight increase in giving which also helped offset the deficit.
The difficult news is that I had to cut one of the part-time maintenance positions. I also had to reduce the Youth Ministry position to 30 hours per week. With these changes and careful budgeting we were able to create a balanced budget for the next year.
We are always looking to improve our Stewardship as a parish and I hope that we can continue to grow our revenue so that we can continue to provide opportunities to grow as disciples.
I hope you are enjoying the summer months and the splendor and beauty of God’s creation.
In Christ,
Fr. Jim Northrop
Pastor